New kitchen

My largest project! When my wife and I bought our house, it was a moral imperative that we updated a few things.

I have included pics of the kitchen and hallway before the improvements. You can guess what pics those are!

First things first, update the kitchen cabinets. This turned into a complete gutting of the kitchen. It included new flooring, new sink, new appliances and pine trim all around to replace that nasty dark mahogany from the 70’s. I am happy to say that my kitchen cost me no more than $3000 to completely gut and remodel. That includes stainless steel refrigerator, stainless steel dishwasher, and a new stove/oven and hood.

I have been slowly replacing dark paneling and mahogany trim with drywall and pine trim for years now. As you can see in the hallway pic, I replaced the dark doors with six panel pine doors and added 3/4” Hickory hardwood flooring down the hallway. The hallway also had dark paneling (left wall) and you can see that it is now painted drywall.

Buying new cabinets was not an option, so I had to learn how to build ‘em. You may ask.. Would you ever do it again? – IN A HEARTBEAT! It was an awesome thing to build my own kitchen cabinets!

The cabinets are 1/2” maple ply with solid maple face frames and solid maple doors. I did not build the doors. They came from Waltzcraft of LaCrosse, Wisconsin.

I have also become a big fan of the Kreg Pocket hole jig.

-- If you want perfection, buy plastic, if you want character, buy wood!

Thanks for all the great comments. The greatest reward that I find about my kitchen and home improvements, is that people want to gather for the holidays at my house, just because it turned out so nice. It’s a great feeling.

-- If you want perfection, buy plastic, if you want character, buy wood!